Pak, Ch'an-uk, 1963-

Park Chan-wook (Korean: 박찬욱; IPA: [pak̚ tɕʰanuk̚]; born 23 August 1963) is a South Korean film director, screenwriter, producer, and former film critic. He is considered one of the most prominent filmmakers of South Korean cinema as well as 21st-century world cinema. His films, which often blend crime, mystery and thriller with other genres, have gained notoriety for their cinematography, framing, black humor and often brutal subject matters. After two unsuccessful films in the 1990s which he has since largely disowned, Park came to prominence with his acclaimed third directorial effort, Joint Security Area (2000), which became the highest-grossing film in South Korean history at the time and which Park himself prefers to be regarded as his directorial debut. Using his newfound creative freedom, he would go on to direct the films forming his unofficial The Vengeance Trilogy: Sympathy for Mr. Vengeance (2002), a financial failure that polarized critics, followed by Oldboy (2003) and Lady Vengeance (2005), both of which received critical acclaim and were financially successful. Oldboy in particular is regarded as one of the greatest films ever made, and helped establish Park as a well-known director outside his native country. Most of Park's works following The Vengeance Trilogy were also commercial and critical successes both in South Korea and internationally, such as Thirst (2009), The Handmaiden (2016), which earned Park the BAFTA Award for Best Film Not in the English Language, and Decision to Leave (2022), which won the Best Director award at the 2022 Cannes Film Festival. He directed the English-language miniseries The Little Drummer Girl (2018) and The Sympathizer (2024).